My thoughts on the video of "Navratri, and the science behind it"

Table of contents

• Reason to make this post
• My thoughts on the claims made in the video
  • Claim 1: Koi bhi exact reason nahi jaanta ki kyun or kaise ki ye(mitochondrial) DNA sirf hamare mothers ki side se hi aata hai
  • Claim 2: Science has already proven benefits of intermittent fasting
  • Claim 3: And this knowledge, that is intermittent fasting, which the world is discovering now has been done in this country for centuries
  • Claim 4: These 9 days of Navratri are a reminder of these changes(we need to change our sleep cycles to adapt seasonal changes)
  • Claim 5: Dance is a method of connecting to our inner energies & vibrations
  • Claim 6: These questions become irrelevant
• Questions that I already had
• Conclusion
• Inspired by
• Video/Audio for this blog

Reason to make this post

I saw a video by Abhi and Niyu that made some claims about “Navratri and the science behind it”¹. I felt good that these folks are questioning, and also answering, the reasons behind the rituals we follow. They also encouraged their audience to let them know: “Which things in our culture confuse you?”.

Although they asked some questions, I felt they missed many other questions which I had. Hence, with this blog, I will share my thoughts on the claims made in their video and put forward the questions I previously had.

My thoughts on the claims made in the video

Claim 1: Koi bhi exact reason nahi jaanta ki kyun or kaise ki ye(mitochondrial) DNA sirf hamare mothers ki side se hi aata hai

English translation of the claim: No one exactly knows as to how and why does this(mitochondrial) DNA comes from the mothers only.

There are 2 points which I would like to make for this claim.

Point 1: Only if the intention of the video makers, implicitly or explicitly, is to bring the context of some supernatural powers or “cosmic powers” or creators, as they did in the video too, only then, they will claim that no one knows or will not know why the mitochondria DNA gets transferred from the mothers. In that case, when someone asks a question related to the same, a straightforward, easy answer to the question would be, “no one knows”!

Further, if you get similar references on the internet to support your claim, proudly show or highlight only those references and hide or reject other information.

This is an example of confirmation bias², and needless to say, it is not the scientific way³ to approach things.

Also, notice how the video clearly fades out everything else and only highlights the sentence: Nobody fully understands why or how fathers’ mitochondrial DNA gets wiped from cells. When the video makers are showing a reference for their claim, they also added a yellow patch at the bottom of the video frame, in which the text is written: Nobody knows as to why we get this DNA only from the mother. If the yellow patch was not there, people would have read the next statement, which was, “an international team of scientists did some studies to find the answers”.

Refer to the screenshots from the video and from the article to understand what I am trying to say.

• Screenshot from the video

• Screenshot from the article⁴

If the video makers wanted to give some scientific view to such questions, they would have explicitly shown the findings or other research details and not the other way round.

However, you would not do it if you did not have a scientific temperament!⁵

Also, can you think about the differences between the below two statements?

1. Nobody knows as to why we get this DNA only from the mother.
2. Till now, we don’t know why we get this DNA only from the mother.

The first sentence has an implicit meaning: Nobody fully understands it, but the chances of fully understanding it is negligible or zero.

The second sentence means that we do not fully understand it, but it may not be the case forever. An optimistic view of science may help answer such questions and hence implicitly cultivate curiosity about it.

Good teachers try to generate curiosity and inspire students. Here is what might a good teacher sound like: “Until now, we don’t know why we get this DNA only from the mother. Perhaps, someone listening/reading/watching this may find answers to these questions.”

Point 2: The video makers have not provided the source of the information. If the source of such information gets provided to the audience, they are free to read it. Therefore, restricting information is a sign of stale knowledge, which is terrible for the overall growth of our society. Moreover, when one restricts any information or questions to the claims, people only have to rely on the fact that the person is making correct claims. However, such thinking or acts, adds friction to our growth, as we are not leading by empirical evidence, but solely on the trust, which can be easily taken advantage of.

Such behaviour, gradually, over the years, completely removes scientific temperament from our minds. We stop questioning and blindly follow anything and anyone!

Such acts also lead to an authoritarian⁶ culture, which is harmful to progressive humanism⁷.

For the betterment of human society, all beliefs/ideologies/views must be open to all types of questions and must be corrected or rejected from time to time based on the evidence and the need for it in the modern world based on humanism.

Claim 2: Science has already proven benefits of intermittent fasting

Can you pause for a moment and think about the problems with the above claim?

Problem 1: This is, again, an example of confirmation bias!.

I believe that everyone must be aware of this logical fallacy⁸. The internet is a double-sided sword. If used properly, we may reap benefits from it, or it can be detrimental to us.

Let me explain my point with the same claim.

People who have watched, heard, or listened to the above statement may do fasting, irrespective of the effect on their body as for them, “science has already proven the benefits of it”. Yes, there are benefits of intermittent fasting, but it can also be dangerous for your body in multiple ways depending on your current age and health.

Before weighing intermittent fasting side effects, it’s essential to know that there are several forms of intermittent fasting, and the evidence of their long-term effectiveness and safety is not yet known. Intermittent fasting is not recommended for pregnant or breastfeeding women, growing children and teenagers, the elderly, or individuals with or vulnerable to eating disorders.⁹

Remember, a person trying to sell you something or convince you to do something, may not wish to tell you the trade-offs for it, as the outcome of you knowing the trade-offs may not be in the favour of the person trying to sell you something or convince you to do something. In such cases, we must ask or seek the trade-offs ourselves.

We often do not tend to seek such information due to the efforts required in it. We generally seek easy solutions, and as long as we think there are no significant costs associated with it we don’t seek such information. I do not say always to do your research for everything that you do, but I would like everyone to test their assumptions, hypotheses and theories often to improve or reject them as and where required.

A person searching on the internet for “effects of intermittent fasting” may get unbiased results rather than a person who is searching for “benefits of intermittent fasting” or “dangers of intermittent fasting”. However, a person who has read through links from the search results of all the above queries will be better positioned to make their judgement.

Problem 2: If science has already proven the benefits of fasting, then as stated above, why is it not recommended for pregnant or breastfeeding women, growing children, teenagers, or the elderly?

A claim or a theory gets invalid if we get a single piece of evidence against it!

Because there is no proof based on scientific studies for it, as the benefits or side effects of it varies from person to person; most studies state that there is insufficient evidence to recommend intermittent fasting, and encourages speaking to one’s healthcare provider about the benefits and risks before making any significant changes to one’s eating pattern.¹⁰

Making a generalized statement or claim based on small or limited data and saying “science has proved it” or “it is scientifically proven” or “it is scientific” makes such statements or claims anti-scientific¹¹ and pseudoscientific!¹²

You can find general patterns to observe such pseudoscientific statements on Wikipedia. I will highly recommend you to go through it as the benefits of it will help you throughout your life. For now, I will just list the properties of pseudoscientific claims from Wikipedia:

1. Use of vague, exaggerated, or untestable claims
2. Improper collection of evidence
3. Lack of openness to testing by other experts
4. Absence of progress
5. Personalization of issues
6. Use of misleading language

After reading and understanding the above properties, try to think of the statements which you have heard and thought they were making sense, but now it looks pseudoscientific!

Just as a deer on sensing a danger by unexpected sound, turns its head and ears in the direction of the unexpected sound to be extra cautious about saving their life; similarly, one should be on a high alert mode whenever a person is trying to justify some claims using scientific words, as almost all such justifications are pseudoscientific!

I would like to recall one of Carl Sagan’s quote:

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

Claim 3: And this knowledge, that is intermittent fasting, which the world is discovering now has been done in this country for centuries

Various religions like Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, Jainism, and Judaism have fasting rituals and have been practicing them for centuries. And since some of the mentioned religions have not originated from India, we Indians were not the only ones who knew or practiced intermittent fasting.¹³

Had the video creators done a simple Google search or just read the first few paragraphs of the Wikipedia article on intermittent fasting, they would not have made such claims!

Also, if this knowledge was useful according to our ancestors in our country, why haven’t they suggested us to do it regularly irrespective of the festivals? Perhaps, it is not due to scientific reasons!

The frog in the well knows nothing of the sea.

Claim 4: These 9 days of Navratri are a reminder of these changes(we need to change our sleep cycles to adapt seasonal changes)

Before the invention of electricity and artificial light from electricity, for us, the only sources of light were sunlight, the light from the fire, and moonlight.

Our sleep cycles were synced to the sunlight. Hence, our bodies adapt to the changes of the season automatically as the changes in the earth’s tilt are slow and gradual.

If the earth’s tilt changes only during nine days, then yes, the above claim makes sense and is valid.

Also, the seasons are not the way before due to climate changes caused by global warming. For example, it was raining heavily in Pune in October 2022!¹⁴ So do you think that the above claim still makes sense in the modern times?

Claim 5: Dance is a method of connecting to our inner energies & vibrations

1. What does “inner energies” mean?
2. What is “inner” in “inner energies”?
3. How do we measure the “inner energies”?
4. How is the “inner energy” created or converted from one form to another?
5. What does “vibrations” mean in this claim?
6. How are these “vibrations” created?
7. What “vibrates” and who “vibrates” it?
8. What are other methods of connecting to our “inner energies & vibrations”?

The use of scientific words in such statements makes it pseudoscientific and anti-scientific! Also, this is an unfalsifiable¹⁵ statement. There are no scientifically accepted definitions of “inner energies” and “inner vibrations”. Without such definitions we cannot empirically test and validate the connection between dance and the above pseudoscientific words. Making use of unfalsifiable statements makes them useless!

The scientific method refuses us to use any words, statements, or theories which are unfalsifiable and cannot be precisely defined and measured/analyzed.

An easy thumb rule to spot pseudoscientific statements w.r.t explanations of ancient philosophies is to look out for the words like:

1. Vibrations
2. Frequency
3. Cosmic
4. Dimension
5. Quantum
6. Entanglement
7. Energy, both positive and negative!
8. Matter
9. Continuity/Discontinuity
10. Consciousness
11. Aura
12. Law of attraction
13. Scientifically proven
14. Equilibrium

It is easy to catch people’s attention by using scientific words to make some claims. It may help you gain views or attention, but it does not make it valid or scientific!

Claim 6: These questions become irrelevant

Who decides and, how do they decide that the questions are irrelevant? I don’t understand why these questions are irrelevant to the video makers! Is it that the questions for which people have an answer are the only relevant ones? If yes, do you think that such practices should be encouraged?

As a child, I always had questions like(and many more):

1. Why does our festival have a ritual of making air and sound pollution? We have taught in our schools how bad it is for our earth and all living beings.
2. Why should we buy new clothes for Diwali even though we have many clothes?
3. Why is it so rare to find any lady priests in the temples?
4. How do we decide the size of the Ganpati idol? If God or Ganpati is everywhere, why do we still need to bring Ganpati idol to our homes? Why don’t we just worship God in our minds?

If we, as adults, claim that these questions as “irrelevant”, we are preventing the growth of the beautiful curiosity in the child and hence the scientific temperament too!

Questions that I already had

1. Why do we celebrate Navratri only for nine days?
2. Why do we celebrate the same festival differently in different parts of our country? During Navratri, why do some people follow rituals of animal sacrifices while others don’t?¹⁶
3. Why don’t we have the same festivals in the whole world?
4. There are different types of fasting. Which kind of fasting should be done during Navratri? Should everyone follow fasting?
5. Why do we fast only for the days during the festival?
6. Does a healthy person, who follows a balanced diet, exercises regularly, and gets good sleep, need to fast?
7. How do we decide which food we should eat or avoid?
8. What happens to those who cannot follow or are unaware of the festival rituals? Will the god/goddesses be angry/sad about them?
9. Why does it happen that out of all the numerous festivals or rituals in the entire world, the one which we follow is always right? If all the people think the same, shouldn’t the others be incorrect?

Conclusion

I think the video makers are victims of the bad education system in our society; hence they made such pseudoscientific claims and they indeed believe in them. I think it is also why they selected only some points for which “they thought” they could give a scientific explanation(according to them). I, too, like everyone else, was a victim of this; but luckily, I got some good friends who helped me question, learn and unlearn many things. It takes time!

As of now, the video makers have a subscriber base of around 3.13 million users. Imagine the number of people who can watch their videos and think of their impact on us if such pseudoscientific videos get made!

I remember the famous dialogue from the Spiderman movie: “With great power comes great responsibility!”.

I do appreciate that they like to ask questions, but they can provide more value to their users by going a step further and having a scientific approach in doing their research and asking tough questions which may even shake their own or our beliefs.

Speaking of Navratri or any other festivals, I do enjoy them, only because I get to meet my dear ones as they do have holidays during the festivals, and we can spend quality time together which during the non-festival season may be difficult.

In the era of social media dominance, irrespective of the holidays during festivals, I encourage people to physically spend quality time together so that you can have deeper conversations. I have observed that your relationship with the other person strengthens with every meaningful and deeper discussion. So don’t wait for festivals to celebrate your time with the people you care about!

Inspired by

1. Damodar Kulkarni
2. Richard Dawkins
3. Shakeel Prem
4. Pranav Radhakrishnan (Science is Dope)

Video/Audio for this blog

For those people who prefer to listening or watching content over, I have made the video of reading this blog.